Search Results for: profile

PNL’s World Or Nothing

Longreads Pick

A profile of a media-shy French rapping duo who are quickly becoming internationally recognized.

Source: Fader
Published: Jun 14, 2016
Length: 15 minutes (3,932 words)

Borges and $: The Parable of the Literary Master and the Coin

Elizabeth Hyde Stevens | Longreads | June 2016 | 31 minutes (7,830 words)

 

Nothing is less material than money. . . . Money is abstract, I repeated, money is future time. It can be an evening in the suburbs, it can be the music of Brahms, it can be maps, it can be chess, it can be coffee, it can be the words of Epictetus teaching us to despise gold. Money is a Proteus more versatile than the one on the island of Pharos.

—Jorge Luis Borges, “The Zahir”

I fell in love with Jorge Luis Borges when I was a freshman in college. That year, full of hope and confusion, I left my hometown for the manicured quads of Brown University, desperately seeking culture—art, beauty, and meaning beyond the empty narrative of wealth building that consumes our world. It is easy to look back and see why Borges spoke to me. The Argentine fabulist’s short stories were like beautiful mind-altering crystals, each one an Escheresque maze that toyed with our realities—time, space, honor, death—as mere constructs, nothing more. With the beautiful prose of a poet-translator-scholar, he could even make money seem like mere fantasy. It was precisely the narrative someone like me might want.

Yet, money is real. We live and die by the coin. Money tells us how many children we can raise and what kind of future they can afford, how many of our 78.7 years must be sold off in servitude, and what politics we will have the luxury of voicing. As a college freshman, I still knew none of this, and I had the luxury of not thinking about money. These days, it seems all but inescapable.

I am still full of hope and confusion, but at 35, practically nothing concerns me more than the coin, a metonymic symbol representing my helplessness. The coin represents this desperate need to support myself and my writing when, in the very near future, I start a family. My mind has changed; all my journal entries turn into to-do lists and career strategizing. Money, planning, and money. I think of little else. Read more…

Why Verizon’s Former Pitchman Is Working for Sprint

You might have noticed that actor Paul Marcarelli, who played a memorable role as Verizon’s “Test Man” for many years, has begun to star in commercials for Sprint, a rival telecommunications company. Why the switch? Some insight can be found in a 2011 profile of Marcarelli by Spencer Morgan in The Atlantic:

Among other things, his initial five-year contract had prohibited him from doing any other commercial work and stipulated that he not discuss any aspect of the Test Man campaign, including the particulars of his contract. (He is still reluctant to go into detail, since he remains under contract with the company.) A 2003 article in Ad Age—titled “Verizon Keeps ‘Test Man’ on Short Leash”—noted that the cellular firm “adamantly maintains … that the actor who plays [Test Man] should certainly not be ‘heard.’” (Indeed, Verizon had declined to verify Marcarelli’s identity even after Ad Age revealed it, in 2002.) The contract was amended in 2006 to include language articulating Marcarelli’s right to promote his own projects, but he still felt hemmed in by the need to protect the character—and with it, his income.

After nine years, Marcarelli was informed via email that Verizon was taking their advertising in a different direction, and Marcarelli was free to pursue other projects.

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Can Clinton’s Campaign Take Control of the Narrative in Time?

Image by Gage Skidmore

The idea that, at this point, there is some version of Hillary Clinton that we haven’t seen before feels implausible. Often, it feels like we know too much about her. She has been around for so long — her story, encompassing political intrigue and personal drama, has been recounted so many times — that she can seem a fictional character. To her critics, she is Lady Macbeth, to her adherents, Joan of Arc. As a young Hillary hater, I often compared her to Darth Vader — more machine than woman, her humanity ever more shrouded by Dark Side gadgetry. These days, I think of her as General Leia: No longer a rebel princess, she has made a wry peace with her rakish mate and her controversial hair and is hard at work, mounting a campaign against the fascistic First Order.

– Rebecca Traister followed Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail for this profile in New York magazine. With access afforded to few journalists, she saw both sides of the narrative made flesh: the stiff, loud, pedantic arena performer and the engaged, relaxed (yes, relaxed!), nose-to-the-grindstone public servant.

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What’s in a Name: 2016 Presidential Campaign Edition

The question of whether or not it’s appropriate to refer to Hillary Clinton as “Hillary” has been unresolved for at least a decade now. It’s offensive, argues Peggy Drexler. It’s fine, says Peter Beinart. It’s complicated, shrugs McClatchy DC.

Juneau_Democratic_Caucus_2_(26054842955)

Back in 2007, the Chicago Tribune’s public editor wondered whether use of the former first lady’s first name was overly familiar, even provocative: “Mrs. Clinton or Sen. Clinton or former First Lady Hillary Clinton are all proper ways to address or refer to her, but just plain Hillary is almost guaranteed to trigger a reaction.” Editor Jane Fritsch told him via email that she disliked the double-standard: “The simple fact is that Hillary Rodham Clinton is running in a field of men who are never referred to by their first names.” Read more…

Prince: 1958-2016

Photo: "Purple Rain" | Warner Bros. Pictures

Prince, the singer, songwriter, producer, and rock star, died this week at the age of 57. Here are six stories about the legendary musician.

1. Prince’s Obituary in the New York Times (Jon Pareles)

Prince recorded the great majority of his music entirely on his own, playing every instrument and singing every vocal line. Many of his albums were simply credited, “Produced, arranged, composed and performed by Prince.” Then, performing those songs onstage, he worked as a bandleader in the polished, athletic, ecstatic tradition of James Brown, at once spontaneous and utterly precise, riveting enough to open a Grammy Awards telecast and play the Super Bowl halftime show. He would often follow a full-tilt arena concert with a late-night club show, pouring out even more music.

Read more…

Weed Reads: A Reading List About Marijuana

Longreads Pick

For your April 20th, here are eight reads on cannabis, from one writer’s journey into America’s first legal pot festival in Colorado to a profile on a scientist researching safe pesticide use in Washington State.

Source: Longreads
Published: Apr 20, 2016

Weed Reads: A Reading List About Marijuana

Over the weekend, Pennsylvania became the 24th state in the U.S. to legalize medical marijuana. For your April 20th, here are eight reads on cannabis, from one writer’s journey into America’s first legal pot festival in Colorado to a profile on a scientist researching safe pesticide use in Washington State.

“More Reefer Madness.” (Eric Schlosser, The Atlantic, April 1997)

“More Americans are in prison today for marijuana offenses than at any other time in our history.” In 1997, Schlosser examined the case to decriminalize marijuana. (Dive deeper in his award-winning two-part series from 1994: “Reefer Madness” and “Marijuana and the Law.”)

“The Scientist Pot Farmer.” (Brooke Borel, Undark Magazine, April 2016)

In Washington State, which legalized recreational marijuana in 2012, scientist Alan Schreiber has studied pesticides for 18 years. Working to further agricultural research, Schreiber focuses on safe pesticide use in cannabis production and provides safety workshops for pot farmers. Read more…

The Top 5 Longreads of the Week

Photo: Reggie Ugwu / BuzzFeed News

Below, our favorite stories of the week. Kindle users, you can also get them as a Readlist.
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The Vanishing: What Happened to the Thousands Still Missing in Mexico?

Araceli García Luna
Araceli García Luna, whose son Juan Lagunilla García went missing. Photos by Grace Rubenstein.

Grace Rubenstein | Longreads | April 2016 | 19 minutes (4,634 words)

Somewhere in Mexico, someone knows the answer to the question that drives Araceli García Luna day and night. The person or persons who know might be criminals or government officials—or both. The jagged beige mountains around the northern city of Monterrey, which hold so many horrible secrets, surely know. You would think, given the circumstances, that someone would help her find out.

Araceli lives in a small apartment on the outskirts of Mexico City. She gets up in the morning and goes to work in maintenance at a local middle school, the same job she’s had for 24 years. She comes home by 5 p.m. and stays there, with two of her grown children, her grandson, and a little frizzy-haired dog named Chiquitín. Araceli doesn’t go out anymore—not for events or unnecessary errands. Except that, once every few months, she packs her purse and a folder full of documents and travels 560 miles to Monterrey. She does this because Juan Lagunilla García is still missing. Because, though the authorities managed three times to find the elusive drug lord El Chapo, almost all of the 23,000 regular Mexicans disappeared in the drug wars remain unfound.

Araceli has made the journey more than thirty times since the first trip in October 2011, the night I met her. And she will keep doing it without fail until she gets an answer to her question: “Where is my son?” Read more…